The stagnant domestic pipeline of ICT-trained students “is unlikely to meet industry demands”, according to a migration review whose 73 recommendations include helping Jobs and Skills Australia (JSA) target skills gaps with a “more dynamic and data-driven approach.”

Clearer data and policies would help sectors like the ICT industry identify skills gaps and – supported by a raft of measures to streamline visa processing that the ACS has identified as problematic in attracting migrants to the Australian industry – would help guide a dramatically overhauled migration policy.

The measure are outlined in the new Joint Standing Committee on Migration (JSCoM) report, entitled Migration, Pathway to Nation Building, which runs to over 450 pages and took nearly two years to complete

“Migration policy must once again become a key lever for Australia’s nation building efforts, as it has been in the past,” committee chair Maria Vamvakinou said in releasing the new report, which among its many recommendations has advised that migration functions be hived off from their current position within the Department of Home Affairs.

Spin off migration

Instead, the committee recommended that a separate Department of Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs be re-established “as a standalone department solely focused on delivering a migration system of world-class standard and ensuring that Australia remains a preferred destination for the world’s most talented migrants.”

Despite the merits of the current labour market testing (LMT) regime – which is based on what the committee called the “sound” principle that “where possible and appropriate local residents should be afforded priority to fill job vacancies” – the committee recommended that migration reform should include the “phasing out of LMT requirements in favour of a data-driven approach by JSA.”

Established in July 2022 as a temporary effort to focus the then-new Labor government’s skills overhaul, JSA was made permanent last year and positioned as a source of data, analysis, and insights on skills shortages that would advise the government on labour market shortages.

That role should be expanded, the committee recommended, with JSA given statutory authority to determine skills and workforce shortages “based on real-time evidence and tailored to geographic and sector-specific circumstances… thus removing ministerial discretion in determining what occupations are included or excluded from these lists.”

That discretion weighed heavily on JSA’s perceived relevance when the membership of the body’s Ministerial Advisory Board was announced earlier this year without any representation from the ICT industry, despite it being Australia’s third largest employer and a key enabler of economic growth across Australian industry.

“There remains a danger of shortfalls if more young Australians are not attracted into ICT training and education,” the report says in citing Tech Council of Australia observations that the number of domestic students pursuing IT-related degrees in Australia has not changed since 2002.

Migration by the data, for the data

As well as using JSA to develop clear and impartial data about skills gaps in ICT and other industries, a data-driven systems would support other measures that the committee believes could speed up approval times in a migration system that has been slammed as unfair and inefficient.

These include the creation of a “secure digital portal for visa application documentation” that could potentially be shared with “trusted partners”; the collection and retention of biometric data for up to 12 months to support multiple visa applications; and a “commitment to modernise the visa system experience for migrants and employers,” including automation of “low-risk processes” and a real-time status tracker so applicants can follow the progress of their applications.

The report also recommends the establishment of an independent national research institute for migration policy studies that would, Vamvakinou said, “provide migration policy a basis in impartial and scholarly evidence going forward.”

“Such research capacity within government has been sorely missed in recent years,” she added, “and will provide migration policy a solid foundation as we move into the decades to come.”

Other recommended changes include a nationally coordinated approach to skills assessment, qualification recognition, and occupational licensing requirements; “automatic” mutual recognition of skills and qualifications through partnerships with comparable bodies in other countries; and the replacement of existing, outdated and rarely updated Skilled Occupation Lists with new JSA-developed lists “flexible enough to account for newly emerging occupations in the economy.”

Let’s not forget ANZSCO

Despite retaining support for the Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations (ANZSCO) – whose 2022 update provided valuable new granularity for some ICT industry roles – the committee recommended ANZSCO be updated more regularly than the current interval of five years, which it called “excessive [given] the rapidly changing nature of modern work practices and associated occupational categories”.

The report also identified the importance of migration policies that favour regional areas – an issue of “utmost importance”, the committee said in recommending that JSCoM undertake a separate inquiry on regional migration “to ensure that our regional, rural and remote areas share in the benefits that migration affords.”